92nd Giro d'Italia - GT

Italy, May 9-31, 2009

Complete live report

Live commentary by Susan Westemeyer

13:57 CEST
Hello and welcome back. After yesterday's nice quiet sprint stage, we are heading back up to the mountains today!

14:00 CEST
We have five, count 'em, five, climbs today. None of them really major but some of them have quite steep sections, and the final climb up to the finish line is really going to put some hurt into a lot of people. So hang around for the fun and games.

14:06 CEST 40km/132km to go
The day's first climb came at km 40.4, the Passo della Collina. It is 777 metres high, and the riders went up 678 of them over 12.6 km. The average gradient was 5.4%, with a max of 8%.

The break went over it in this order: Grivko ahead of Visconti and Bonnafond.

14:16 CEST
The break group today was no surprise, the question is whether they can make it through to the end.
One thing is for sure, the top dogs, who are all in the peloton, will all be keeping a very close eye on one another. They are all so close together that only a few seconds could make a difference.

14:20 CEST
The finale today, with that nasty closing climb, is the finish used in the one-day race Giro dell'Emilia. And who won that race last year? Danilo Di Luca. Who would love to win and claim those 20 bonus seconds? Danilo Di Luca.

14:24 CEST
We are floating along here in the blimp, but having problems looking down at the race. We really do need new glasses..... But as soon as we can see something, we will update you on the race situation.

14:30 CEST
The race started today in Campi Bisenzio, whose claim to fame is that it is where the internal combustion engine was built for the first time by Felice Matteucci and Eugenio Barsanti.

14:34 CEST
Will the group get through to the end? Or will one of the favourites go for it at the end? Or what? You can discuss this and every other aspect in our forum.

14:34 CEST 70km/102km to go
The group is holding onto a a relatively steady lead of 4:30.

14:39 CEST
Happy Birthday today to Giampaolo Cheula of Barloworld, who is turning 30 out there in the escape group today.

14:43 CEST
The second climb is the Valico di Mediano, km 77. This one's a little higher, 888 metres, with the peloton climbing 569 metres in 14.7 km. The average gradient is only 3.9% but the maximum is 12%.

Everyone is on the climb now, with LPR leading the peloton up. The gap has dropped slightly, to 3:50.

14:45 CEST 77km/95km to go
And the group is over the top, with Grivko ahead of Visconti and Bonnafond. Hm, that sounds familiar to us.

14:48 CEST
And now the peloton crosses the summit, at 3:52. They aren't going to let this group really get away.

14:53 CEST
Let's start taking a look at some of our break participants. Bonnafond is a 21-year-old first year pro. The French youngster rides for Ag2r. When he was younger he was a stand-out at both basketball and cycling.

14:58 CEST
Cheula, as we said, turns 30 today. The Italian turned pro in 2001 with Mapei-Quick Step, and rode with Vini Caldiroli from 2003 to 2004, before joining Barloworld. He won the Peace Race in 2006. Last year he won the GP Nobili Rubinetterie – Borgomanero.

14:59 CEST
And we have the first to withdraw from today's stage: Jelle Vanendert of Silence-Lotto.

15:03 CEST 86km/86km to go
LPR continues to lead the chase. Interesting that LPR is doing the work for second-placed Danilo Di Luca, instead of Rabobank doing it for leader Denis Menchov.

15:06 CEST 90km/82km to go
Ian Stannard of ISD has "kissed the pavement", so to speak.

15:08 CEST 90km/82km to go
The gap is now 3:27.

15:12 CEST
There aren't many more chances for a sprinter here at the Giro, so the dominant sprinter has said ciao and left the race to prepare for the Tour de France. Columbia team manager Rolf Aldag explains why yesterday was Mark Cavendish's last stage. "He has had a very successful couple of weeks at the Giro, but he is still young and he has a long career ahead of him. He has already raced 55 days this year and it is our view that the best thing for Mark is to take some recovery now before the Tour."

15:13 CEST 100km/72km to go
Stannard has now caught up with the peloton again following his crash. The gap is 3:35 up to the lead group.

15:17 CEST
The other Barloworld rider in the break group is Christopher Froome. The 24 year old was born in Nairobi, Kenya, but has ridden under a British licence since 2008. He started out as a mountain biker but then turned to the road. Froome turned pro in 2007 with Konica Minolta and joined Barloworld last year.

15:21 CEST
Keep an eye on Levi Leipheimer, who will attack at some point yet to come in the Giro. We just don't know when, and neither does he. "I keep saying it, but it’s day by day and kilometer by kilometer," Leipheimer told the AP. "If I feel good enough, I will attack, I promise you."

15:25 CEST 105km/67km to go
We have Rifornimento, or the feeding zone, at Vergato from km. 103-106. It has a population of nearly 6000 and is 42 km from Bologna.

And that is where the break group is now, with a lead of 3:38.

15:27 CEST
Müller is now having trouble keeping up with the lead group.

15:31 CEST
Vasili Kiryienka of Caisse d'Epargne is 27 years old. The Byelorussian rode for Tinkoff for two seasons before joining his current team this year. He has won numerous time trial titles, does well on the track and is in his third year of making an impression on the road. He won a stage in last year's Giro.

15:36 CEST
The sun is shining again today and we see lots of open jerseys.

15:37 CEST
It looks like Menchov is wearing new shorts today, with a pink patch replacing the orange patch. Looks a little better, we think. Somehow pink and orange don't really go so well together.

15:38 CEST 110km/62km to go
The gap is back up to exactly four minutes.

15:40 CEST
LPR continues to do the lead work, as they all head up the next climb. That is the Valico di Tole at km 117. It is another Category Two,747 metres high. The field will ride 14.6km to climb 542 metres. The average gradient is 3,7%, with a maximum of 8%.

15:45 CEST
Philip Deignan is a 25 year old Irishman. He rode for Ag2r for four years before joining the new Cervélo team in 2009. This is his third Grand Tour, having ridden the Giro last year and the Vuelta in 2007.

15:47 CEST
Müller is definitely out of the lead group as the group sprints for the mountain points. Once more, Grivko was ahead of Visconti, but this time Deignan was third.

15:48 CEST
Milram's Björn Schröder was one of the men of the day yesterday, spending 158 kilometres ahead of the field. At first part of a three-man escape group, he continued on his own when the others were caught, but eventually he too was caught by the peloton with only 5 km to go. "Of course it hurt, but it was fun," he noted on radsport-news.com.

His teammate Müller just crossed the mountaintop, 2:45 behind the group.

15:51 CEST
Tyler Farrar of Garmin-Slipstream is right up there in the mass sprints, but hasn't yet been first across the line. DS Matt White said, "A stage win would have been nice, but we’re still a young team. We may have fallen a bit short of today’s goal but it wasn’t for a lack of commitment! There’s still a lot of racing to be had here and for the rest of the season."

15:55 CEST
Simon Gerrans of Australia, 29, rode for Ag2r from 2005-2007, and then spent a year at Credit Agricole before coming to Cervélo. He won the Tour Down Under in 2006 and won a stage of the Tour de France last year. This year he brought in top ten finishes in Amstel Gold, Fleche Wallonne and Liège-Bastogne-Liège.

15:59 CEST
We have had several mails asking where is this that or the other rider. Except for the break group, everyone is still together in the peloton.

16:03 CEST
Niels Hansen wrote in to say the thinks the break will make it through to the finish line. "The only team interested in catching up is LPR, and they know they will need all their strength in the next five days and will likely stay put. Both Rabobank and Astana knows, that their GC contenders can follow Di Luca on the last climb but not beat him in the sprint, so they rather see the bonus seconds go to someone else."

"But as a Dane I have to say (or shout): WHERE IS SAXO BANK???" Well, they are somewhere there in the peloton but we must honestly say we haven't really seen much of them today. Or for the whole Giro, for that matter.

16:06 CEST 132km/40km to go
Only 40 km to go to the finish line in Bologna.

Bologna! What do we think of? Food, what else! And not that pink lunch meat Americans love to put on their fluffy white bread. Yuck! But real food like Sauce Bolognese and famous pasta dishes like tortellini and tagliatelle.

16:10 CEST
What do you think? Will the group get through to the end? It is starting to look like a good possibility. Join the discussion about it in our forum.

16:12 CEST
3:52 is the gap as the peloton passes under the 35 km to go banner.

16:13 CEST
There aren't many kms left to go but they include two climbs and an intermediate sprint.

16:14 CEST
To return to our favourite topic of food, pork is a big thing here – ever hear of Prosciutto? And then there is Ragu, a thick rich tomato and pork sauce just waiting to be poured over pasta.

16:15 CEST 142km/30km to go
30 km still to go for the lead group, with the next climb coming in only seven km.

16:18 CEST
This region has been nicknamed "La Grassa" which means, bluntly, the fat. And if we stay here much longer we will definitely fit that description.

16:18 CEST
The escape group is now approaching the penultimate climb. And their lead has now dropped to under three minutes.

16:21 CEST
Climb number four is the Category Three Mongardino. It is only 352 metres high, with the guys taking 2.1km to go up 135 metres. So what, you ask? Well, it is short but steep: an average gradient of 6.4% with a max of 12%.

16:23 CEST 147km/25km to go
The group hits the next km banner. Let's see how much their lead has dwindled this time.

16:24 CEST
Deignan jumps out of the group and heads up to the mountain top. Does he just want the points or will he try to stay away?

16:26 CEST
The gap to the peloton is about 1:30. Deignan is not really very far ahead. But meanwhile, Visconti is having trouble hanging on to the group.

16:27 CEST
Deignan has a handful of other riders with him now, and surprisingly it looks like Grivko has fallen out of the group.

16:28 CEST 150km/22km to go
One LPR helper is ahead of Di Luca in the peloton, with Menchov tight on his heels.

16:29 CEST
The peloton comes to the mountain ranking banner with the gap at 1:44.

16:31 CEST
Froome took the mountain points ahead of Bertgalioti and Petrov. And Visconti has been caught by the peloton.

16:33 CEST
The pink jersey was never endangered by this break group. The highest ranked rider was Froome, who is over 14 minutes down.

16:35 CEST
Di Luca now has two helpers, as LPR continues to lead the chase.

16:36 CEST
They managed to squeeze a TV intermediate sprint in here at km. 156.3.

16:37 CEST
The gap is now less than a minute.

16:40 CEST
Kiryienka took the sprint, followed by Vorgonov, and we don't know who was third.

16:41 CEST
There is less than 20 km to go today, but Lance Armstrong goes back to the team car and loads up on water bottles for his teammates. No problem though, the limit has been cut back to 10 km today.

16:42 CEST
Menchov and his accompanying teammate are sharing a water bottle.

16:44 CEST
The gap has grown to about two minutes, let's make that 2:13.

16:45 CEST 160km/12km to go
12 km and two minutes..... can they survive? And with that nasty finishing climb staring them in the face?

16:46 CEST
Acqua & Sapone has taken over the lead work now from LPR.

16:47 CEST
And now we see a Rabobank at the head of the charge, with Liquigas coming up on the left.

16:47 CEST
Menchov empties a water bottle and tosses it in someone's front yard. Actually their front courtyard.

16:48 CEST
Gavazzi leads the first group as they head through downtown Bologna.

16:48 CEST
Who are the famous sporting sons of Bologna? Pierluigi Collini, the famous bald football referee, well-known to Europeans who follow that "other" sport. And skier Alberto Tomba, who won three Olympic gold medals and two World championships in the various slalom events in the 1990s.

And Alex Zanardi, an auto racer who tragically had both legs amputated after a race crash, but miraculously has returned to racing on the FIA World Touring Car Championship circuit.

16:49 CEST
Grivko takes off out of the lead group.

16:51 CEST
Wow, the Liquigas rider leading the peloton just got an involuntary shower. A fan emptied his water bottle in the rider's face. No doubt he meant it nicely, but the riders just don't appreciate it.

16:51 CEST
The chasing field is really speeding along now. Grivko starts ascending.

16:53 CEST 170km/2km to go
About 1:28 for Grivko over the chasing peloton.

16:53 CEST
But the group of favourites isn't really doing anything. No one is willing to go for it.

16:54 CEST
Whoa, hard going here.....

16:54 CEST
Grivko is no longer in the lead, now it is Gerrans and Froome.